Planned Parenthood's immersion in 'transgender care' shouldn't get a pass

Since the Trump administration proposed withholding Medicare and Medicaid funding from clinics and hospitals providing sex-rejecting “services” to children in December 2025, over 40 clinics or hospitals have announced the temporary or permanent closure of “gender-affirming care” programs targeting minors.

Yet, despite the backpedaling of some institutions regarding “gender-affirming care” inflicted upon minors, Planned Parenthood seems to have doubled down on its targeting of children. 

Key Takeaways:

• Several hospitals and clinics have been stepping back from promoting "gender-affirming" care for minors after a detransitioner successfully filed suit against those who removed her breasts at age 16.

• The FTC has sent legal demand letters to certain groups promoting 'gender-affirming' practices as part of an investigation into whether those groups made "false or unsubstantiated claims" in their "marketing or advertising of pediatric gender dysphoria treatment."

• However, one of the most significant providers of "gender-affirming" care, Planned Parenthood, does not appear to have received a demand letter, and is doubling down without apparent fear of reprisal.

• Though most groups take their cues from one leader in the "transgender care" movement (WPATH), Planned Parenthood has been chastised for falling below even the most questionable current practices.

The Details:

As part of a consumer protection investigation, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sent legal demand letters last month to the World Professional Association of Transgender Health (WPATH), the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), and the Endocrine Society, which (along with Planned Parenthood) have portrayed ‘gender-affirming’ practices to the public as “fact-based” and settled science.

Bloomberg reported:

The civil investigative demands seek information as part of a probe into whether the groups allegedly made false or unsubstantiated claims related to the marketing or advertising of pediatric gender dysphoria treatment, according to documents made public Tuesday on the FTC’s website.

The Endocrine Society, WPATH, and the AAP responded to the FTC probe by filing “Petition[s] to Quash or Limit the United States Federal Trade Commission’s Civil Investigative Demand[s],” with all three petitions similarly questioning the FTC’s authority to investigate and alleging violations of their constitutional rights. 

Why not Planned Parenthood?

But despite being a self-professed leader in “transgender care” which markets heavily to minors, neither the FTC nor any other government agency has announced an investigation into Planned Parenthood. During last year’s FTC workshop, psychiatrist and author Dr. Miriam Grossman explained how Planned Parenthood and others may be utilizing deceptive language along with the potentially fraudulent use of medical codes for "gender-affirming care" so insurance companies will cover the financial cost.

And yet, Planned Parenthood's affiliates continue to receive substantial taxpayer funds while doubling down without fear of reprisal. During an annual “Trans Advocacy Day” rally at the Washington state Capitol earlier this month, Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates vowed to “...protect abortion access, defend transgender youth, and fully fund sexual, reproductive and gender affirming health care….”

Planned Parenthood Gave Her Testosterone at 16 — Paid For With Your Tax Dollars

Shifting tides? 

At the end of January, a detransitioner known as Fox Varian, who underwent surgery to remove her breasts at age 16 and is now 22, was awarded $2 million by the jury for her injuries.

According to independent reporter Benjamin Ryan, there are currently at least 27 known lawsuits regarding detransitioners, some of whom were minors at the time of surgery.  

Shortly after Varian's award, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) and the American Medical Association (AMA) walked back their full-fledged endorsement of transgender surgery on minors.

The AMA said in a statement to National Review:

“Currently, the evidence for gender-affirming surgical intervention in minors is insufficient for us to make a definitive statement. In the absence of clear evidence, the AMA agrees with the ASPS that surgical interventions in minors should be generally deferred to adulthood.”

Senior Fellow of the Manhattan Institute and co-author of the previously mentioned HHS report, Dr. Leor Sapir responded to the National Review’s reporting by asking on X, “If the AMA was wrong about surgeries, could it also have been wrong about hormones?”

The ASPS Position Statement also stressed “substantial uncertainty” regarding the “long-term benefits and harms of medical interventions such as puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones…” on children and minors. 

The Background:

Live Action News previously reported on a 2025 workshop hosted by the FTC to “examine whether some of the practices in gender-affirming care are deceptive and require greater scrutiny,” with a particular focus on minors. The workshop featured medical and mental health professionals, legal experts, and the testimonies of detransitioners.    

In November 2025, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released a report, Treatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria: Review of Evidence and Best Practices, which contradicted many of the claims made by WPATH and other ‘trans’-promoting institutions.

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. stated:

“The American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics peddled the lie that chemical and surgical sex-rejecting procedures could be good for children… They betrayed their oath to first do no harm, and their so-called ‘gender-affirming care’ has inflicted lasting physical and psychological damage on vulnerable young people. That is not medicine — it’s malpractice.”  

But it isn't just the AMA and the AAP that have been peddling this lie. They're taking their cues from somewhere — and that organization is WPATH.

WPATH: The group 'behind the curtain'

The World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) — along with its national subsidiaries such as the United States Professional Association for Transgender Health (USPATH) — portrays itself as the expert that promotes “high quality of care for transsexual, transgender, and gender-nonconforming individuals.”

WPATH's “Standards of Care and Ethical Guidelines” are cited and promoted by many pro-abortion institutions — the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), the American Psychiatric Association, the Endocrine Society, and others across the country who pay to be WPATH members.  

Originally named the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association (HBIGDA), WPATH is closely tied to the work of endocrinologist and sexologist Harry Benjamin, who perpetuated the belief that some homosexual individuals were “born in the wrong body” and could be “cured” through “transition,” as Live Action News previously reported. Benjamin’s ideology “countered accepted theories at the time as it eschewed the typical treatment of using psychotherapy to realign a person’s mind with his or her biological reality.” 

Who's who

Harry Benjamin, who coined the term “transexualism,” had great influence in the U.S. and became the connection point for ‘transgender’ and pro-abortion ideologies that have since infiltrated virtually all major institutions and sectors of American life, from law, medicine, and psychology to academic institutions — ultimately penetrating primary and secondary education nationwide under the guise of “sex-ed.”   

Richard Green, founding member of HBIGDA, was a close colleague and defender of alleged child abuser John Money. Green advocated for same-sex marriage and for the removal of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) classification of homosexuality as a mental disorder. Green largely authored the criteria for “Transsexualism” and “Gender Identity Disorder of Childhood” in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-III). 

He later became president of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sex (SSSS). Still around today, this organization helped to set the “accreditation standards” for self-professed “experts” in sex education in the U.S. It did so by legitimizing the depraved views of Alfred Kinsey, Wardell Pomeroy and Mary Steichen Calderone (former Planned Parenthood medical director and SIECUS founder), which were rooted in so-called "research" obtained from pedophiles who sexually abused infants and children.   

In 2006, the HBIGDA became the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), and claims to be an “interdisciplinary professional and education organization devoted to transgender health,” a group of self-appointed 'experts' in the pseudo-scientific field of "transgenderism."   

When 'substandard' is lower than you thought

However, never a stranger to pushing the envelope, Planned Parenthood has taken WPATH's philosophy and ideology to heart while throwing even WPATH's most lax guidelines out the window. Planned Parenthood has been caught willingly prescribing some minors hormones on the same day as initial appointments, with no prior mental health evaluation or professional diagnosis.

The fact that WPATH’s former chair, Laura Edwards-Leeper, called Planned Parenthood’s practices “substandard” is telling. 

The Bottom Line:

Since 2000, Planned Parenthood has ended the lives of an estimated 7.5 million pre-born babies while receiving over $11 billion in taxpayer funds. Essentially, taxpayers are being forced to fund Planned Parenthood's sexualization and “transgender” indoctrination of the minors it failed to kill through abortion. 

The taxpayer-funded destruction of children, born and preborn, must come to an end.